There are many methods available for groups of individuals to engage in conferencing. One common method, videoconferencing, involves one or more individuals located in one location engaging in a videoconference with one or more individuals located in at least one other location, remote from the first. Videoconferencing involves the use of video equipment, such as cameras, microphones, displays and speakers. When the remote location has more cameras than the local location has displays, individuals at the local location have an artificial and unrealistic experience during the videoconference. Similarly, individuals at the local location may have a diminished experience if the aggregate number of cameras at several remote locations outnumbers the displays at the local location due to continuous switching among the signals from the cameras.
To address such problems, certain systems employ metrics to determine how or where a video image is displayed. For example, some videoconference systems will only present one video signal at a time on a monitor. In these videoconference systems the video signal that is presented within the display is usually determined by voice activity (e.g., the last person to talk is the one that is presented). Some systems may support as many displays as there are remote sites participating in the videoconference. As the number of remote sites participating in the videoconference increase so does the number of displays. Other videoconference systems may divide the monitor into a plurality of displays where each display is associated with a particular remote site (these types of videoconference systems are sometimes referred to as Hollywood Squares or Continuous Presence). While such systems may allow for the participants at a local site to constantly view each remote participant, user experience may be diminished because such systems may not maintain spatial consistency. Additionally, these systems may necessitate reducing the size of each image in the conference to accommodate each remote site and/or participant that joins the conference.